


Stars

by burlesonspride



Category: Joshifer - Fandom
Genre: F/M, joshifer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-08
Updated: 2014-09-08
Packaged: 2018-02-16 16:04:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2275941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/burlesonspride/pseuds/burlesonspride
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Be careful what you wish for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stars

As the credits begin to roll, I lean forward and roll my neck from one side to the other. A loud ‘pop’ sound emanates from my body followed by an audible sigh. I turn my body to sit up straight on the plush couch and uncurl my legs from beneath me. They scream in both refusal and release as I stretch them out before me. An arm wraps around my shoulders and pulls me in. With nowhere else to go, my head lulls on his shoulder but the rest of my body stays rigid against his side. I’m not really in the mood for cuddling. We’ve been doing that for the last two hours, during which time my mind was focused elsewhere.

“Did you like it?” he asks nuzzling my ear and further irritating me. I turn to him and simply nod, pursing my lips together in my failed attempt at an emotion other than the ‘get the fuck away from me’ feelings I’m currently swimming in. I sigh internally because I know my current state of being is not his fault. It’s no one’s fault to be honest. I suppose if anyone’s to blame it would be me. I should be past all this by now. Letting it eat away at me isn’t something I should be allowing, yet here I am, all but seething. Fuck, I didn’t even enjoy the movie and it was one I was looking forward to seeing.

The entire day had been priming me for this I suppose. After showing up to what I thought was going to be a small cast get-together I was hurled into one of the most awkward situations I’ve ever faced. It wasn’t the meeting of men that caused distress; they’d met before; a few times actually. It was the intrusive and almost interrogative looks and questions I received the rest of the afternoon from Nick. It was the snide comments he’d make when Josh would ask me if I needed anything, or how I wanted my burger cooked. At one point I had to drag Nick in the house and remind him that we were in fact at Josh’s rental and he was simply being a gracious host. Of course in turn I was rewarded with an eye roll and nice long pull on his beer.

When Nick and I decided we would try this again, we had agreed to not ask about what transpired during our time apart earlier this year. That rule stood for about two weeks, and then Comi-Con happened. The media began hurling Josh and I into the spotlight; chomping at the bit about our ‘ _chemistry’_. Everywhere you looked, online, in print, and television there was our picture. Well, our _pictures._  Our faces were slapped absolutely everywhere. Instead of using the images for promotion for the film, they were used as fodder for the tabloids and entertainment shows. It made me laugh to be honest because when there _actually was_  something going on between Josh and I, there was no mention of him as a ‘potential boyfriend’. In fact the most laughable part was the media was hell bent on pairing me with either Bradley, who’s dating Suki; or Liam, who was at the time entertaining an affair through his  _engagement!_

A few days afterward, while the buzz was dying down, Nick began to press. Nothing too intrusive at first but he’d say things like, “Can you believe that crap about you and Josh?” I would of course nod and move on from the subject. But he soon graduated from off-key comments to outright questions. One night he asked me if I had fooled around with Josh while we he and I were still together, during the filming of the first movie and I told him no. That particular night ended with Nick on the couch of our rental in Montreal. The nerve to accuse me of cheating on him was enough to leave me seething for days. I was so pissed off that I flew out to LA for a weekend. I just needed to get away.

I flew back into Montreal the following Monday and Nick was waiting with an apology, a bag and a bottle of wine. He took me to a park and we spent the day reading, relaxing, and enjoying each other’s company. It meant a lot to me because something like that would be impossible in LA. The day ended with us wrapped in each other. I thought that whatever had possessed Nick to push me days ago was buried. I was wrong; I had woken up later that night and found him on the roof patio of our rental, smoking. It was a habit he only indulged when he was worried or stressed about something. I joined him on the wicker couch; he turned and asked me flat out if Josh and I had ever been together. He took my silence as his answer. I watched him as he exhaled smoke into the cool night air over and over. After a few minutes of his silence and my watching the lights of the city, he turned to me and asked me when it had happened. I told him that Josh and I had gotten together while in Hawaii and a few weeks after. I also assured him that I would never cheat on him and that if he was still feeling like I could have, we have bigger issues that needed to be addressed. He left it at that, but ever since that night he’s been a bit more distant than usual.

I find myself still battling this because I never asked  _him_  about his time while we were apart. I never once approached him about the things Zoe had told me. If anyone had ground to stand on with accusations of an affair it’s me. I was hearing from Zoe and other people in the same circles, whispers about Nick and Riley, his Mad Max co-star. How they would disappear together and not resurface till days later. I would be told of late night meetings and stolen embraces. All this seemed to be taking place while  _we_  were  _still_  dating last year. I kind of felt like it was confirmed when they appeared at the Met Ball together earlier this year; and then again the next day. But like I said, we made a promise to start fresh this go around; to make a new go of it.

I’d spent the last two weeks with him on set of his latest film in Louisiana. We were attempting to steal just a few more days of our rekindled honeymoon period. I knew that once I took off to Atlanta to begin the marathon shoot for Mockingjay that we would have limited time to spend with one another. Even though there was still a bit of tension between us since the night on the roof, we seemed to move past it and I began to feel like the chill that had settled over us was dissipating.

Four days ago Nick had informed me that he was going to have a few days off from the shoot and wanted to accompany me to Atlanta and help me get settled in. At the time I was excited to extend our time together. I wanted to introduce him to the cast he’d never met before, take him to the dives and hidden places in Atlanta the cast and I had discovered last year during the Catching Fire shoot. Basically I was excited that I could include him in this experience; that was something that we didn’t have last year. And in my naïve nature I thought that, perhaps he and Josh could somehow find peace with each other and we’d all live happily ever after in the fairytale land known as fame.

I was wrong.

Josh was pensive when he noticed Nick trailing me through the backyard but he extended his hand and made us both feel welcome. He never made an effort to make small talk with Nick but he included him in general conversation, never talked over or around him, and was as accommodating as one could be in the situation. Nick and I hadn’t gone wanting for anything during the afternoon. Drinks, food, conversation, you name it. It wasn’t until Nick’s fourth or fifth Guinness that I began to feel his grip tightening. I noted the change in his mood; he’d gone from mild mannered and observant to a quiet obnoxiousness.

While Josh and Sam we’re manning the grill for dinner, Nick and I sat together on one of the benches that lined the oversized deck. Josh had turned at one point and shouted how we would like our burgers cooked. I told him how Nick takes his and then simply said that he knew how I liked mine. Nick rolled his eyes and shook his head like a defiant five year old and made the comment, “Oh I bet he knows how you like it.”

I was shocked by this comment. And he wasn’t shy about it either. The words managed to escape our proximity and my shocked and narrowed eyes were met with a questioning stare from Josh. His brow was furrowed as if to say ‘Did he really just say that?’ With my mouth still slightly agape, I shook my head and mouthed, ‘I’m so sorry.’ His gaze lingered on me a moment more before his lower lip disappeared between his teeth and he broke my stare, turning back to the task at hand.

I stood so fast that the world seemed to tilt on it axis; after taking a moment to gain my bearings I reached down and grabbed the collar on Nick’s button down shirt and tugged hard. He stood up and I drug him through the crowd and into the house. We weaved our way through the kitchen and I noticed the pantry door was slightly ajar. I pulled the door open and whipped Nick ahead of me and into the small room. Closing the door, I turned to him “What the fuck was that?” My eyes had narrowed at him and my nostrils flared as my anger built with each passing second he withheld his reply. “Huh? Answer me? These people are my co-workers and my  _friends_  Nick!” Still he had no answer.

He took a long pull off his beer and rolled his eyes, “It was just a joke Jen.”

I planted my hands on my hips as I shook my head in disbelief, “That’s your fucking answer for every snide remark or rude comment you’ve made recently.” I threw my hands up exasperatedly and became very animated as I began to speak in a mock British accent, “ _Huh, huh, huh…It’s just a Joke Jen. Lighten up Jen. It’s no big deal Jen. I was just playing Jen_.”

He laughed sarcastically, “If you’re going to make fun at me, at least try a little harder.”

That was it, after everything that we’d been going through lately, I finally snapped. I reared back and my hand met his stubble covered cheek with a tingling sensation that left behind a slow burn on the palm of my hand. “It was a mistake having you here” I mumbled as I examined my hand.

As if the slap had sobered him up, he sat the beer on a shelf full of cereal and took my stinging hand in his own, “Look, I’m sorry. I just… I don’t know how to act around him Jennifer.”

“Try acting normal.”

He brought my palm to his lips and placed a soft kiss on the red skin, “I’m sorry.”

I stared up at him, watching his blues eyes dart between my own and my hand. I gripped his chin in my fingers and turned his head slightly to examine his cheek, “You should be.” He chuckled and a small smile threatened to tug at his lips, “Did I hurt you” I asked.

“You pack some power, but I’ll be fine.”

I released his chin and buried my hands in my back pockets, “He’s just being nice. He’s not treating me any differently than he is anyone else here. And frankly Nick, you need to get over yourself.”

“I know.” He hesitated briefly and then leaned in for a kiss.

“You’re out of your damn mind right now” I said while turning my face away from his. “I’m still mad at you.” He sighed heavily as I turned away from him and walked out of the pantry. I was still going to try and enjoy my time here.

The rest on the evening was fairly uneventful. Nick managed to keep his jealously to a minimum. I could tell Josh was making an effort to avoid me unless necessary. He’d never want to unintentionally start a fight between Nick and I and avoidance seemed to be his answer. He seemed to vanish after dinner, leaving Sam and his wife Laura out back with the rest of us. Nick became engaged in conversation with Sam about their days on the theatre stages in London. Laura and I spent the time talking about real estate in England and potential spots that I had looked at years previously and her opinion on them.

A bit later Woody emerged from the house and shouted that the home theatre had been set up and anyone who wanted to join was welcome to come see the new Star Trek movie. Sam made the comment that the theatre room was where Josh must have gone off to earlier. I was excited to finally watch that film, it was one I had missed while on set, So Nick and I accompanied Sam and Laura and most all the other guests into the house.

When we all entered the room we took in the massive recliners that filled the center of the room and the plush couches that lined the walls. A large screen filled the forward wall and a projector hummed above our heads as it booted up. Nick and I settled in on one of the front couches as the rest of the people filtered in the room.

After a few minutes Josh entered the room and thanked us all for spending the afternoon and night hanging out. He stopped short of the first row of recliners and slid in next to Sam and Laura. He lifted a remote and the room went dark, then the screen illuminated and the surround sound began to thunder through the room. I leaned into Nick’s body and tried to let go of the tension between us.

My attempt to enjoy the move was short lived. Throughout the duration of the film I would catch glimpses of Josh and Sam snickering, laughing, and quoting the film. They seemed like the very best of friends. It bothered me. It bothered me because that was he and I last year. Hell that was us earlier this year. I was his best friend. We were the ones being shushed in the theatre. We were the ones with inside jokes and we were the ones who would not only quote the film but make up our own dialogue.

Seeing him and Sam is nothing new, I was privy to the birth of that friendship. I was jealous back then too but it was never something that a late night stop by Josh’s room or villa couldn’t keep at bay. At the end of the day, I knew Josh was mine. It didn’t matter if we watched hours’ worth of mindless YouTube videos, played Jenga, watched television or spent hours wrapped together in sheets; we were together. We were each other’s.

But knowing that I no longer have that promise, that he is no longer mine, nor I his; it’s enough to make my shudder with the loss. It was my decision, I know that.

So here I am, seething on this couch, tucked under Nicks arm and wanting to be anywhere but here. I watch as the other occupants of the room begin to slowly filter out the door way and through the house. Sam climbs over two recliners and leaps from the last one, landing in the spot next to me on the couch, “Hey Jen.”

“Hey Sammy”

“Did you enjoy the film?”

“You mean the movie that was going on during you and Josh’s conversation?”

Sam placed his hand over his heart in mock hurt, “Ouch. You’re in a hump.” He glanced around my head and spoke to Nick, “Someone missed their bedtime. Better get this one home before she throws a fit.”

I turn my face, resting my chin on my shoulder and see Nick chuckling lightly, “Yeah, we both need to be getting off; been a long day.”

I whip around to face Sam and silently mouth quickly, “Where’s Josh?”

Sam’s eyes flit to Nick as he leans forward to put his shoes back on. Satisfied Nick cannot see him, he mouths back, “Out back. Porch.”

I raise my eyebrows and discreetly point to the door and mouth, “Please?”

Sam knows I’m asking for a distraction to go see Josh without Nick trailing me so he reaches over and pushes me off the couch, “Get outta here Lawrence, I wanna chat with your boy. Ya know, man stuff.”

I act as if hurt by this but silently say thank you as he eagerly dives into a heated conversation with Nick over football and their predictions over who will be in the World Cup next year. I graze Nicks arm and lean in briefly, “I’ll be back.” I pull back and point between the two of them, “You boys stay outta trouble until I come back.” They nod and wave me off becoming lost in idle chatter that I have no desire to try and define.

As I exit the room and turn down the hallway I can hear people shuffling through the front of the house. Some are saying goodbye, others are telling Woody to thank Josh for having them over. I watch as Liam grabs a few bottles of open and half-drunk liquor bottles off the counter of the kitchen. He places a finger to his lips telling me to be quiet. I just laugh and snatch a bottle of Belvedere, “The cost of my silence.”

He winks at me and begins to head toward the front door with a few more of the guys from the crew. Shaking my head I turn and skim around the counter glancing back behind me once more. I catch Woody’s gaze and he raises and hand and holler’s “Goodnight” from the front door. I simply raise my hand and smile at him. Once he closes the door behind him and soft quiet blankets the house.

I hear a light padding coming down the hallway and hope it’s not Nick. I release a relaxed sigh as Laura comes around the corner and greets me with a smile.

“Did you like the movie?” she asks walking towards the kitchen sink.

“Yeah, It was good. Did you?”

“I couldn’t hear a bloody thing over those two chatting. They’re both a pain in my arse.”

“I know what you mean” I say quietly as I glance out the wall of windows into the dark yard. There are no lights on, and although the moon is out, none of its light reaches the yard. I catch a flicker of light followed by the orange glow of a burning cigarette. It emits just enough to see the soft silhouette of his face as he looks out over the darkness.

The water running in the sink shuts off and draws my attention back indoors. Laura turns to face me and studies me for a moment. She then hops up on the counter and dries her hands with a discarded dish towel. She glances out the windows to the burning glow and then down the wall from which she came, “Go on. Sam can talk but he tends to begin going in circles and that can really halt a conversation.” She sends me a knowing smile and nods her head in the direction of the porch.

“That obvious huh?” I mumble.

“Jen, do you want to talk about you being obvious or do you want to steal a few moments with him?”

I shake my head and walk to the door. With my hand on the handle I turn to Laura, “Thanks” and with that I slide the door open and the cool breeze of the night brushes the stray hair from my face. I see the glowing cigarette turn towards me and I finally catch a glimpse of his face in the blackness. “Hey.”

“Hey, what are you doing out here?”

“I was looking for you.”

“Oh really?” he asks, taking another drag off his cigarette.

“When did you start smoking?”

He breathes the white cloud into the night and faces forward when he answers, “I didn’t really. It’s just something I do when I feel like I need to think about something.”

I step forward until I am shoulder to shoulder with him, standing before the first step.

“When did you start drinking right out of the bottle? I thought that was a special occasion kinda thing.” He smiles as he looks down and points to the bottle of vodka I’m holding.

“Oh you know. It’s something I do when I need to think about things.” I use his words with a light, playful tone and nudge his shoulder. Then I reach down and set the bottle beside my feet. “So what’s got you wrapped in thought tonight?”

He takes another long pull off the cigarette and then turns away from me to release the smoke. When he does a word rolls out and drifts off with the vapor, “You.”

I can’t stop myself from saying it now, his omission that I am his trouble causes the words to roll right off my tongue, “I miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

A minute of silence falls between us and I can feel it distancing us the longer it’s left to feed on our pain. I feel a sudden panic that if I don’t say something right now that I may lose him; where this paralyzing fear came from beats me. But as the tremble in my hand begins I blurt out, “How’s… um, Claudia? How are you guys?”

He chuckles softly, his chest rising and falling as the small smile plays at the curl of his lips, “She’s good. We’re okay. I guess.”

“That’s goo – wait, what do you mean ‘I guess’?”

“We’re not really talking at the moment. We had a pretty ugly fight the last time I was in Spain.”

“What happened?”

“It was an accumulation of things. The fans were a bit of a sore subject for her. And then she brought you up -”

“Me?”

“Yeah, said that we were a bit too ‘coqueto’. She didn’t like it.”

I shake my head in confusion, “What the fuck is  _coqueto_  Josh?”

“Flirtatious.”

I reach down to his hand and take the cigarette resting in between his fingers, lightly grazing his knuckles in the process. I put the cigarette to my lips and take a drag, “Um, ok; how so?”

“All that shit that circulated after comic-con. I guess some of her guy friends were telling her that how we were acting was not how friends act.”

“Josh, seriously? We didn’t act any differently than we always have. What the hell?” I’m bewildered that someone would actually fight with Josh about this, but then I remember how Nick had caused me to lock him out of our bedroom and make him sleep on the couch for the exact same thing weeks earlier.

He shrugged his shoulders and looked over at me, “I know. That’s what I told her but she didn’t seem to want to hear it or believe that you and I are just friends.”

My chest tightens at the words  _just friends._ I mean, sure, we’re friends but we’re so much more to each other than  _just friends._ He’s been my rock for the last two and a half years. He’s my best friend, my shoulder to cry on, and my personal therapist. I won’t even get into the long list of things he became when we became lovers. To say  _just friends_ seems to cheapen everything we’ve shared.

“Josh, does she know about us? I mean, about Hawaii?”

He shakes his head and reaches down in front of me and picks up the bottle by my feet. Standing back up he brings the rim to his lips and takes a drink of the clear liquid, “Ahh. That burns” he laughs, “No. She doesn’t know about that. She never asked.”

I take one last long pull on the cigarette before it burns to the butt and then I reach forward to snuff it out in the ashtray sitting on the railing next to me. “Have you thought about telling her?”

He turns to me looking stunned, “How in the hell would that help the situation? Confirm her fears? No thank you, I don’t want to be on the receiving end of that argument.”

“Maybe if she knows that we’ve already been down that road she’ll be less likely to think that’s what we’re doing now.”

“Does Nick know?”

“Yeah, he knows. But he didn’t know until a few weeks ago. But trust me, he asked. He wouldn’t leave it alone until I told him.”

“And how did that end up?”

“Not great initially, but we’ve managed to get back on track.”

“Yeah,” he scoffed, “that explains the relapse tonight.”

“I am so sorry about that Josh. He was drunk.”

He leans in and bumps my shoulder, “No worries.” He sighs and looks up at the sky. It’s a deep blue sea of shimmering stars. So many that you feel lost if you gaze to long. “So you really think I should tell Claudia about us? When we are going to be on set together for eight months? You think that’s a good idea?”

I watch his features as he gazes skyward. I watch the notch in his jaw tense and the muscles underneath his stubble covered skin ripple. His eyes dart from one burning speck to the next, the reflection leaving his eyes full of glittered shadows. “I think it might make your relationship with her a bit better.”

He drops his gaze and meets mine head on, “What if I don’t really want to keep pumping life into that relationship?”

I feel the soft graze of his pinky finger against mine between our parallel bodies and then he links it with mine, “Josh…”

His eyes stay with mine and I see something I haven’t seen since the day we decided that we couldn’t take our relationship any further, I see longing and hurt. His bottom lip becomes locked as he bites down on it, his eyes searching mine for any sign of agreement.

I sigh deeply and turn my attention back to the darkened yard, “I love him Josh.”

He laughs sarcastically and drops his hand from mine. I’m immediately hit with an emptiness that only tends to come around when he’s leaving. He reaches over and snatches up the pack of cigarettes and pulls a fresh stick out. Reaching into his back pocket he pulls out a lighter and cups his hand around the flame to ignite the tobacco, “Yeah, I know”

I turn fully to face him, “I love you too. Do you not see that?”

This time he doesn’t laugh, he just blows a puff of smoke and side-eyes me, “I know. And I do. I just wish it was enough.”

I reach out and grab his arm at the elbow and allow my hand to slide gingerly down his toned forearm until my hand slips seamlessly into his, our fingers linking like they’ve done a thousand times before. I lick my lips as I tug lightly at his hand and the air between us dissipates as we move into one another. The heat of his body is so familiar to my own that it feels much like coming home, “Josh, I…”

Suddenly the door slides open and I drop his hand and take a quick step back, allowing space between our bodies. Laura nearly Jogs out on the patio and snatches up the bottle of vodka. She looks back and forth between us frantically and begins laughing. He eyes widen as if telling us to play along so we both begin laughing along with her. She takes a swig from the bottle just as Nick slips out onto the porch, “Here you are I was wondering where you ran off to.” He walks over to me and snakes his arm around my waist and kisses my cheek.

Laura pipes up, “I stole her. We were on the hunt for the vodka and we found it out here with Josh. We got to talking and Jennifer was just telling me about the time you and she were locked out of your flat back home in the middle of a rain storm.”

Nick begins laughing and suddenly chimes in with “Yeah, she ended up sick for three weeks. I felt terrible.”

I look up at him and caress his cheek with my hand, “Oh well. I got better.”

I am suddenly aware at what an amazing friend Laura had become. I had told her that story a year ago. She was saving my ass. I’ll have to remember to thank her for this.

Josh clears his throat, “Well, you two better get going, I know Laura and I have kept her too long.”

Nick looks at him briefly and then back to me, no hint of anger or knowledge of what was really happening out here while he was indoors, “Yeah. Ready love?”

I simply nod and he pulls me to him in a turn to the door.

Laura stays planted next to Josh as if to keep up the façade of a continued conversation after our exit, “Night you two!”

I look over my shoulder, “Night Laura.” I glance over to Josh and watch him watching me walk away. The sight shatters me and if I weren’t currently being held I would turn and run to him, “Goodnight Josh. Thank you.”

He simply nods and raises his hand in a half wave, “Night.”

As we step into the house I look back once more and watch as he turns back around and lowers himself to sit on the step. Laura drops next to him and wraps her arm around his shoulders. They both look up and watch the sky in silence.

Later, as Nick and I lay in bed I can’t seem to find sleep. He snores softly beside me and I simply lay there watching the ceiling. I finally roll onto my side, his arm draped across me, and glance at the window. A soft glow comes from behind the closed blinds and I feel an immense pull to see it for myself. I slip from underneath his hold and pad over to the large window. I turn the blinds until they are slanted in such an angle that I can see the sky from my spot on the bed.

I climb back under the blanket and nestle into my pillow. From here I can see the lit sky, shimmering like diamonds in blue velvet. Calm washes over me and my eyelids become heavy. For whatever reason, I feel like I can sleep knowing that there’s good chance Josh is watching the sky as well. As I watch them I make a silent wish to spend the night with Josh, if only in my dreams.

My eyes close and soon the breathing next to me is assigned to a dream; a dream where the man beside me has hazel eyes instead of blue; a dream where we are not interrupted on the porch. A dream where I tell him that it is enough, that I am still so in love with him that it hurts; a dream where his lips capture mine and I am made whole again.

I supposed I should be more careful what I wish for.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.
> 
> Much love to all,  
> M
> 
> Tumblr: burlesonspride


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